She doesn’t spare me a glance as she slips into the black water. The gentle sound of it bubbling and rushing creates a sense of privacy. It seems strange to think we just happened upon each other in this exact place not so long ago. That she’s been swimming naked in front of my house for who knows how many years.
“You gonna come in?” she calls once she’s submerged enough to cover just over her nipples. She’s like a goddess with the swells of her breasts on display, the tips of her long hair plastered over her collarbones.
I have no idea what I’m doing. I feel out of my element. Out of control around her.
Consumed by that night, by the guilt of going too far, and by the knowledge that it plays on repeat in my mind twenty-four seven.
I still wake up at 2:11, distraught. Except now, by 2:15, I’m fisting my cock and dreaming about sliding it into her.
Skinny dipping with her might be a bad idea, but I can’t stomach the idea of telling her no again, so I start undressing. I kick my shoes off and face her full on, half expecting her to turn and shy away from me exposing myself.
But she doesn’t.
She watches with rapt fascination, a blatant level of interest as I slide my boxers down over my hips and let them fall at my feet. I toss them onto the log where she discarded her pajamas and make my way toward the water. My eyes stay on her face, while hers focus on my dick.
“Is your penis normal big? Or like … ” She worries her bottom lip before holding her hands up in that twelve-inch spread again. “Big big?”
“Bailey.” I shake my head, my voice disbelieving and gruff all at once. “You can’t just ask people things like that.”
She presses her lips together and blinks away from my cock before moving onto her back to float. “Why not? You just stripped in front of me. And we’re engaged. And I practically sat on it the other night. It seems like a reasonable question to me.”
I groan as I slip into the water. “Trust me, Bailey. If you sat on it the other night, you’d still be feeling it today.”
She jolts back upright as I approach her, eyes wide and dancing with interest. “Does that mean it’s big, big?”
A deep chuckle rumbles in my chest. Being able to laugh anywhere around 2:11 is a fucking treat. “Yeah, Bailey. It’s big, big.”
She slaps the water. “I knew it! I was trying to compare it with porn. You know? But, like … the scale seems off on my phone screen, and it was dark in your room, so I didn’t get a good look—”
“Bailey.” I close my eyes, sink down, and pull a few handfuls of water up over my face.
“Sorry.”
But she doesn’t sound sorry. I can hear the smile in her voice. The water swishes as she spins in place like whatever innocent but filthy mermaid she’s portraying.
It really is the most charming combination. Old enough to not be freaked out by sex but inexperienced enough to be flat-out curious.
She’s going to be the death of me.
And my restraint.
We float in silence for several minutes. Me, trying to rid myself of the insta-boner she gave me, and her … I don’t know, just swishing around.
It’s peaceful.
“I think you should tell me about 2:11,” is how she shatters the peace.
I knew this was coming when she referenced the timestamp before. She’s a bright young woman—perceptive—so it shouldn’t surprise me she put it together.
Deep down, I might be ready to talk about it. There’s no shrink couch here. She’s not holding a notepad or assessing me like I’m an experiment.
I am one of the lucky ones who has ample access to therapy, but one of the dumb ones who won’t go. I know I should, but it fills me with dread. And I’ve had enough of that to last me a lifetime.
Several minutes pass as I consider her question and replay that night in my head. The days that followed.
“It was 2:11 a.m. when I walked out of that bunker with Micah draped over my shoulders.”
The swishing stops, and she pushes upright. I opt to look at the moon rather than the dark orbs of her eyes.
“I checked my watch and could see the helicopter taking off. And I knew what time I needed to be back at our extraction point to get on the transport back out. I knew that if I kept going further back into that tunnel system, I wouldn’t make it out in time.”
I hear her sigh.
“But I kept going anyway. I could hear him screaming. And I—” I swipe an agitated hand over my mouth. “Fuck, I just couldn’t leave him there, you know? He was our mission, and I could hear him. He was right there. I couldn’t leave.”